Solar farms are generally categorized as renewable variable power generation systems because the energy is harvested from sunlight: a naturally occurring and plentiful source of energy. However, the amount of power produced by the solar farm may vary as a function of cloud coverage and the position of the sun in the sky. Each solar farm may have a plurality of energy harvesting panels with associated photovoltaic cells and inverters that may require power monitoring and control for coordinating and providing power to the electrical grid. For example, a utility may monitor the grid power demand and may need to communicate with the solar farm to determine if the solar farm has the capacity to meet some or all of the power demand.
It is common to connect many small solar inverters to the electrical grid, making the collection of inverters appear as one power plant. As the number of inverters in the plant increases, it is important that the collection of inverters appears to the grid as if it was the same as other power plants. Because a solar farm can include many solar panels and inverters, there is a need for a centralized control to collectively manage the inverters along with all of the supporting plant data as one cohesive system. As more solar farms come on-line, the communication, coordination, and control among the plurality of farms becomes more and more critical. However, coordination also becomes more difficult when the multiple solar farms (with their multiple associated controllers) are tied together in ad-hoc systems. Therefore, a need exists for systems and methods for controlling power in renewable solar energy sources.